After a brief intermission, this blog is back from today to cover this month’s New South Wales state election. Unfortunately due to the tight timeframes around the New Zealand, Victorian and Queensland elections I was delayed in completing my NSW guide. I have now finished all preparatory work and am full-steam-ahead on posting seat profiles.

Ipsos machines rang 80,000 voters, 1400 of whom did not hang up, on landlines which 12 percent of voters do not have, on summer nights when few under sixty were at home, and showed the Coalition on 49 and ‘closing’; that is, losing twenty-four seats not fifty.

Abbott derided Turnbull as ‘recycled rubbish’ and Ipsos and Newspoll showed him losing twenty-four seats not fifty-six. This outcome indicated the voters were ‘factoring in Abbott’s end already’, Uhlmann, a Liberal voter, beamingly assessed. It seemed wrong Turnbull should be walking his dog Bobo unguarded on a street where both might be seized and beheaded, but there you go. Daesh couldn’t do this to them in Parliament House, and that was what mattered.

Another day, another twist in The Abbottalypse, from the AFR: The latest monthly Fairfax/Ipsos poll shows the Coalition trailing Labor by just 51 per cent to 49 per cent on a two-party preferred basis. …Mr Abbott still remains highly unpopular and Malcolm Turnbull has stretched his lead by 4 points to 39 per cent as […]

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Just when you thought the Great Australian Housing Bubble was running out of steam, the national auction clearance rate delivered another frothy result, driven again by strong demand in Sydney and Melbourne. The preliminary national clearance rate was a hot 77.1%, just a smidgen under last week’s 77.7% and comfortably above the 74.2% recorded at […]

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By Martin North, cross-posted from the Digital Finance Analytics Blog Speaking on ABC Insiders yesterday, Josh Frydenberg, Assistant Treasurer made the point that the foreign investor regulations, recently announced were open for consultation, and that a number of issues had yet to be resolved. For example, should a foreign investor pay the fee each time […]

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From Westpac’s Phat Dragon: The People’s Bank has announced a 25bp cut in benchmark deposit and lending rates, taking the 1-year rates to 2.50% and 5.35% respectively. That follows a 40bp cut in rates late last year. Writing on February 5, Phat Dragon anticipated a near- term cut, the timing of which was “ … […]

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For Australian nationals, we are examining suspending some of the privileges of citizenship for individuals involved in terrorism.Those could include restricting the ability to leave or return to Australia, and access to consular services overseas, as well as access to welfare payments.[Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, National Security Statement, 23 February 2015]Read this quote carefully. Think about it long and hard. Because Tony Abbott is talking about you.

North Coast Voices was sent this copy of a letter which forms part of a lengthy engagement in the political process by one hardy and dedicated group of Knitting Nannas Against Gas. Nationals MP for Clarence Chris Gulaptis can be in no doubt that his lack of political spine has been noted.

Here’s another post highlighting a film festival. It derives from my frustration at being able to actually work out what’s worth seeing and when from festival propaganda which is mainly directed at trying to get you to go, not helping you work out what you’d like to see. Regulars know that I’ve been doing this for some time. I get someone in India to identify films that have passed a quality threshold – judged by standard review sites and other reviews and then run them up for me. Then I put them up here for everyone’s benefit.

Paul Dellit has written some excellent political articles for The AIMN, so it came as some surprise that he is better known for his screenplay writing. Thomas Keneally, in a recent review of one of Paul’s screenplays I wrote: “I liked your screenplay and plot very much” and went on to describe it as “a very interesting and well-wrought script”. This particular screenplay – a spy thriller set in 1992 involving a MI5 mission directed at uncovering the source of stolen Russian radioactive material – has been turned into a novella (with input from Mr Keneally) and prior to publishing in hard copy has been offered to The AIMN.

James Supple writes in the socialist magazine Solidarity about the ongoing and deep-seated problems in bourgeois politics. He finishes off with this:

Underpinning the turmoil in parliamentary politics is the low level of class struggle. The greatest strength the working class majority has is in its industrial strength and in mass movements to fight for change outside of parliament. This is where real reforms, for land rights, equal pay, penalty rates and long service leave, have been won.

That is why socialists put such emphasis on fanning the flames of struggle—this is where the hope for change lies.

The year’s second Ipsos poll for the Fairfax papers seems to confirm two things: the government’s poll recovery from the depths of the leadership spill, and the pollster’s relative lean to the Coalition. The poll records a straight four-point exchange on the primary vote, with Labor down to 36% and the Coalition up to 42%, and the Greens up one to 12%. This gives Labor a lead of just 51-49 based on 2013 election preferences.

The town I live in and surrounding areas have just endured a cyclone. The damage is heartbreaking. The stories from people and the hardship they are enduring are even more heartbreaking. Through this experience, I no longer believe we live in a lucky country.

Can Robots Die? is a short story written in a modern experimental style. As with much of my poetry, and my other short story If You Dare, it is also a comment on today's society. Both stories are on my Author Website.

There is very little point in explaining the plot of a short story. Once you have read it once you will read it again. After that perhaps you will tell your friends so they can enjoy it too.

Last week we briefly looked at some of the problems with the current tax system. It seems that a number of those who should have a high level of understanding of the fundamental flaws in the current taxation system agree that the system needs reform. Price Waterhouse Coopers suggest: